So, you’re approaching thirty and instead of growing up and getting on with being an adult, you’re still playing in a punk band and working in Primark. By the time your parents were your age, they were married with 2.4 kids and holidaying in Bognor Regis. They had a property boom to look forward to, a secure job and a generous pension scheme. Their destinies were all but written.
‘Bad Lucky’, the new album from Leeds three-pieceTHE MAGNIFICENT, is largely a reaction to being born at the wrong point in history. Beginning with ‘1981’, which is effectively a musical pastiche of the newspaper headlines of that year, it reminds us of the kind of Britain that they and their peers grew up in, evoking the Toxteth and Brixton riots of that year. Nine years later, the biggest problem in their lives was England crashing out of the World Cup Finals. Third track ‘1990’, with its rousing chorus “my head’s still moving on but my heart’s still in 1990”, may deal with trivial matters, but for many of us, that heartbreaking moment is one of our earliest memories and worthy of a mention.
Just in case you’re wondering, not all of the tracks are named after years. Clocking in under two minutes, the jacked-up hardcore flurry of ‘Working Men’s Club’ could have been written in Thatcherite Britain, while ‘Buy More Crap’, with its empowering refrain “it’s about time you made this town your own”, attacks 21st century materialism.
A slightly weak album closer in ‘King of the Denim Jackets’ is the only criticism of an album which is both reflective and poignant, while retaining a youthful spirit and positive outlook throughout.
Across the pond, Pittsburgh punks Anti-Flag have released their own protest album ‘The General Strike’ which tackles similar themes to that of ‘Bad Lucky’ but where their American peers rely heavily on using tired old adages, such as “get up, get up, your voices are needed, become the pulse of the revolution”, THE MAGNIFICENT have taken a long hard look at the collective chagrin of a disillusioned generation and decided that to identify with people in their music, all they had to do was say what everyone was thinking:
“Tell me, tell me what will I grow up to be, tell me when will I stop trying to make ends meet.”
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